Here Are Your Dumbest Stock-Trading Congressmen

Everyone who is not a savvy financial professional would be well-advised to pursue a single investing strategy: buy and hold. That means, whatever you do, do not try to "trade" stock and mutual funds, as if you know what you're doing. Because you don't. Millions of Americans grasp this concept. At least two of their elected representatives do not.

The WSJ today publishes its very worthwhile annual analysis of the harebrained investing tendencies of our nation's esteemed Congresspersons. The entire article is good for a laugh. But these two Heroes of Political Investing deserve to be highlighted:

Sen. Tom Coburn (R., Okla.) made more than 200 trades in stocks and bonds in 2010, and says he has lost money trading in each of the seven years he has been in Congress.

Rep. Luis Gutierrez, an Illinois Democrat, made dozens of trades in stocks and mutual funds, including two instances in which he bought and sold a fund in the same day, even though the share price of mutual funds doesn't fluctuate within the same day.

Tom Coburn, who is crazy in addition to being dumb, is on the Senate's Committee on Finance. Gutierrez is on the Financial Services Committee.